Pillar to Post
by graceofgod
Summary: A hunt that hits a little too close to home leaves one Winchester struggling to deal with memories and reality


A/N: Set late in season 2, this assumes there was a reasonable amount of time between WIAWSNB and AHBL - so much that it's probably slightly AU... Slight spoilers for What Is... but nothing else. Thanks to Ilka and Ash for the beta!

As usual, I wrote this fic to music, and as often happens one track in particular. It inspired the title, and there's a snippet of the lyrics here but really, the whole thing is just awesome. _Hotel _by Mark Lanegan.

_I saw you in a dream,  
filled the hours in between  
when I called myself alone,  
when I disappeared below._

_I remember your face,  
but it's been a long, been a long  
been a long, long day  
and what I did along the way,  
I wouldn't care to say._

_~~*~~_

There were fingerprints, painted in bruises on his hand and he couldn't take his eyes off them.

Faintly, he heard a voice come and go, mutters and whispers and low, soft concern. Something settled across his shoulders, warm against chilled skin, tucked in around him where he huddled on the floor with a murmur that faded into the rush of static in his head.

Hands on his shoulders again, digging into his arms as he was shuffled backwards until his spine met something rigid - bed frame, part of his mind identified numbly, distantly - and his head tipped back onto the mattress.

He drew his knees up and just sat and stared at the fingerprints.

Antiseptic and rubbing alcohol stung his nose and throat. A gentle hand caught at his arm, the one that didn't have such a hold on his eyes, tugging it out to the side and he felt breath rush warm over his wrist, hissed and jerked once as the disinfectant stung deep.

"Sorry, dude."

He tuned the rest out; let it fade to white noise, buzzing through his head with the exhaustion that came after a week-and-a-half of not sleeping, of downing coffee in the bathroom when his hands started shaking and his brother declared enough was enough and cut him off. Of choking up out of nightmares where the sun shone bright and warm.

He stared and watched red turn to black, wrapped around his hand.

They felt like a lie. Like the rest of the world was monochrome reality and those five, slowly darkening bands were the over-bright, life-flashing-before-your-eyes dream and he clung to them, as though if he looked away for just a second he'd wake up and the real world would come crashing down around him.

Again.

He shivered, pulled his outstretched arm back close to his side, gauze wrapped tight around it rough against his chest through the thin, wet cotton of his tee-shirt where he hunched on the floor. Staring. Eyes watering, somehow dry at the same time.

When the gentle hands urged him up, he stood numbly, felt the world spin and tilt, fade to black at the edges as he lost sight of the bruises and memory took over, dragged him back to

_landing on his back in the long grass, choking for air as shaken lungs tried to remember how to function, one hand shaking up to wrap around the ragged gash in his arm, just below the elbow where nails like claws had torn through jacket and shirt and skin. A grin leered down at him, all crooked teeth worn to ragged points, stained dark, black in the gathering dusk, silhouetted by the bloody sky and god, how glad was he that he couldn't see what it really was on that smile. He rolled awkwardly, still fighting to breathe, ninety percent sure he'd be way, way too late, cringing away from the touch that never dug into his neck. Face buried in the dirt, arms wrapped around his head he sucked in gritty air and finally dared to peer past the crook of his elbow. _

_His heart thumped painfully hard at his ribs, adrenaline singing through his blood at the sight of a broad back wrapped in tattered shadow, swaying as it strode easily to the third player in this scene, this screwed to hell and back nightmare where his brother wavered on his knees, one hand pressed against the flow of blood dripping from his temple. He coughed out a denial and scrambled to his feet, shaking his head to clear it but his knees felt like rubber, the world tilting and greying at the edges as if his body had forgotten how it worked._

_Grass whipped at his legs as he stumbled into a run, still gasping for air but this he could never forget. This job he would know blind, deaf and dying, instinct driven bone deep. He growled low in his throat as he closed the gap, burning eyes fixed to the shambling, dark shade and his brother groggily blinking up at it, at the hand wreathed in blue flames that stretched out towards the blood._

_It looked like a benediction._

_He screamed, wordless with fury and helplessness and terror as his brother's eyes rolled white, lit cold by the glow of the Djinn's fire._

Someone murmured in his ear, caught him as he started to crumble the way he'd wanted to for days. He'd been too scared. Afraid of what might be waiting for him, like a child hiding under the covers: if he couldn't see it then it wasn't real, if he never dreamed it then it never happened and maybe he could just forget.

Hands on his arms held him, lifted him carefully as spun glass. He felt about as fragile as they edged him down to a thin, hard mattress that swamped him, cocooned him. A big hand cradled his head, eased it onto a pillow, slid down to his arm and rolled him onto his side and just stayed there, warm and steady.

He sank into the mattress, dimly aware of a spring poking at his hip, another digging under his ribs. Lethargy crept through him, tugged at him with the memory of a cold, empty field, rain pelting down on his curved back, mixing with salt and sweat and blood on his cheeks until he felt something trickle down over the bridge of his nose, soak into the warm cotton under his head and let the ache in his throat bring him back to the hand on his arm.

He inched his hand up until it rested next to his cheek on the pillow, breathing a quiet sigh as he saw the bruises again and the hand on his arm tightened briefly, almost enough to leave him with a matching set.

His mouth quirked at the thought but he was beyond tired, beyond worn, chilled and bruised right down to the soul and it was so, so easy to lose his grip on the world, for his eyes to slip shut and hide the bruises again.

In the dark behind his eyes, he saw

_blue fire glinting from an empty, lifeless stare and shuddered, flinched away, his gaze catching on something that glittered in the grass. He swerved, still and molten heart lodged in his throat as he stooped, stride never slowing, never wavering as he snatched the knife up, settled it in his grip, fingers easy around the hilt when it felt like he was clutching it so hard bone should break._

_His boots pounded the grass, still wet from the rain that slowed them, that made them wait to come out to the field where a half dozen people had been found, exsanguinated and hollow. They'd thought it was a vampire or some kind of succubus, never thought it could be a Djinn out in the open even though he'd felt a shiver of recognition when he saw the morgue files, the empty stares too distant for death, strangely content._

_It wasn't something they saw often. _

_Spray flew silver around him as he charged, all lethal grace and numb, trembling rage. He saw his brother begin to fall, begin the long, slow slump to the ground, the Djinn's burning hand still clamped to the bloody head and he fought for speed, dragged it up from somewhere that ached and hurt with the memory of mowing lawns and a kiss that tasted like honey and a touch on his cheek. _

_When he was still three feet too far away, his brother's head began to tilt sideways, to slide out of that blue touch and into dream. He gasped soundlessly, lunged, _**too far, too damn FAR **_screaming for him in his head._

_When he hit, it was like colliding with a freight train, with a Mack truck and how screwed up was this life that he knew _**exactly **_what that felt like, if a hazy memory fractured by blood and raw agony could be called exact. _

_Sunk to its hilt, to his fist, in the Djinn's back, the blade sang with the shock of impact. He blinked away a flash of a cold warehouse, the same surging hate made him cruel again and he twisted it, a savage wrench of his wrist and felt the life drain away, saw the flames gutter out and fade. Shoving the corpse aside, his heart suddenly, finally remembered how to work and hammered hard in his throat as he fell to his knees where the Djinn had loomed, hands scrabbling at his brother's torn shirt, trying to stop the helpless, lifeless slide._

"_nononononono..."_

_Ran out of breath, dragged in air and lost it again in the same shaky denial. He ducked, trying to catch his brother's eyes, sparing one hand from the frantic grip on his shirt to lift the lolling head and lost his voice to the cold, empty stare. _

The hand on his arm shifted, worked in small, slow circles. He snapped his eyes open, jaw tight, breath quick and thin until he saw the dark marks barring his skin. Relaxing felt like sinking, felt too much like giving in and his shoulders twitched, jerked back.

"Hey, hey take it easy man."

For the first time, the murmur was clear, was whole and the hand flattened across his shoulder, gripped softly, shook him lightly, once.

"Just take it easy. I've got you."

He cut his eyes up, thought _but who's got you? _as he saw the pale face and dark eyes, half-hidden in shadow and grief. Dropped his gaze again, guilt uncurling roughly in his stomach, seeking out the fingerprints, still trying to make sense of it through the exhaustion that fogged his head, that slowed his pulse.

"I'm not going anywhere, dude. Okay? You got me back. I'm stayin' right here."

He wanted to laugh at that, at the memory of being too late and loneliness in the middle of a cold, empty field, in the middle of the home he barely remembered_,_ but it was too raw still, the ache still lodged in his throat like stone.

He shivered instead, fixed his eyes, wide and dry on the bruises, the world slowly tilting back to the right way up as they coloured and the bed shifted under him, dipped. He rolled with it, too loose to fight gravity until his shoulders and hips met something that was all warm angles and hands that caught him, eased him back into a broad plane that beat with a slow, steady rhythm.

"I'm not goin' anywhere. I promise."

He blinked at the room, breathed in stale rain and crushed grass, old blood and dried tears. Stared at the bruises, cage of dark shadows around his hand and tried to match the echoing loneliness with the arms that wrapped around him.

Tried to remember which one was the real world and which was just the dream.

Slowly, the ache in his throat eased, the blurred, uncertain edges around his vision faded to just the familiar haze of weariness. The memory of cold rain in the night slipped away, turned insubstantial and faint, and he let the even beat against his shoulder, the warm breath that skipped unsteadily over the back of his neck ground him.

Croaked out, "Sam?" voice cracking with exhaustion and left-over grief.

"Dean? Hey, hey. You back with me, man?"

Tilted his head back, watched as a pale, worried face leant over him, shaded by long, lank hair, an edge of darkness along his brother's temple in the shape of a handprint.

He lifted his hand, bruised with his brother's fingerprints and fitted it along the Djinn's mark. Sam twitched away, caught himself and leant into the touch with a weary, battered smile.

"Sam. Y'kay?"

"Yeah, Dean. I'm fine."

He frowned, searching hazel eyes, gaze flickering to his hand where it lay along the faint mark. There was something there, a flinch, a distance he recognised and still sluggish with the cold and the weariness that chewed through at his thoughts, he wondered what the Djinn had shown his brother.

"Liar."

Sam frowned, pulled back a little, didn't look away and his hand cinched tighter around Dean's shoulder. He waited, watched the younger man, tiredness unlike any he'd ever known weighing him.

"I will be," Sam offered, quiet, reserved.

Dean heard, _I'm not okay, but you can't fix this _and recognised it.

He smiled weakly, gave back a fraction of a nod and sank back into his brother's shoulder with a slow breath.

Sam lifted the hand from his arm, curled it around his, long fingers fitting into the bruises.

"Sleep, Dean. Okay? I'm not going anywhere. Just sleep."

He slept.

_He shook his head, shook his brother, just _**shook **_with more than cold, more than exhaustion, shook__for hours as the clouds rolled in and played peek-a-boo with the moon. He shook through the rain that fell, shrugged awkwardly out of his jacket and then his shirt, wrapped both around his brother's shoulders. The downpour was sudden and hard, gone as fast as it had come, leaving them in the middle of the field, one corpse staring at the sky, two shadows huddled on the ground. He shook as he__clutched the chilled body to him, wrapped his arms around the other man and held on, heart choking him, blood running cold then hot, ice then fire, sweat and tears mixing with his brother's blood on his face._

_And then something nudged at his cold fingers where they twisted in his brother's shirt._

_He froze, caught between nightmare and wish, a half-formed thought that maybe the Djinn had caught him, touched him with that aching fire, tossed him spitefully into some crazy horror-flick dream world where his brother would be dying and gone and lost and something else, something other, _**notSam,**_ would be..._

..._trying to hold his hand._

_His fist uncurled, plaid crumpling stiffly away, replaced by cool skin that fumbled slowly, curled around his hand slowly, _**slowly, **_like it was a million miles away or maybe just in a whole different world._

_He hesitated, wanted to clutch at the hand in his but afraid, so afraid he ached that if he did, it would just be cold and lax. Biting his lip, he tasted blood on his tongue, didn't feel the tiny burn amid the fire raging through him and tightened his grip in a convulsive squeeze, knuckles cracking._

_And couldn't choke back the whimper that slipped loose when the hand in his squeezed back._

"Go to sleep, Dean."

He huffed, slouched in the seat, shrugged his jacket higher as a chill crept under the collar and wondered if he could hide nudging the heater up another notch or two.

"Change the freakin' record, Sam. I've been sleeping for three days."

Sam grinned at the road, faintest edge of strain around the smirk. Dean growled under his breath but let his head roll against the seat back until his temple pressed into the window.

The cool glass felt like rain, like cold sweat and blood and he jerked back with a hiss, found his brother's hand flat against his shoulder.

"Dean?"

"'m good," he murmured absently, blinking away afterimages with a short shake of the head.

"Yeah. Sure. Seriously Dean, we could've stayed in another couple of days."

"Sam. I'm. _Fine," _he bit out, spoiled it with a yawn that cracked his jaw. Sam just slanted a glare at him, turned back to the road. Dean dragged his focus to the window, to the reflection, drinking in the sight of his brother, pale and thin in the glass. He skimmed a thumb across the yellow and green bars across his hand, set his teeth against a shiver and another yawn, gave in to both when the effort was just too much.

Felt Sam's worried glance and sighed at the familiarity of it after three days of not much else. It was still better than the cold, empty stare that waited for him in his dreams.

"_How long?"_

_Sam had waited as long as he could stand to ask it. Three hours, driving down monotonous blacktop, trying to convince his own mind he was awake and free, half-remembered faces and laughter lingering shadows in the back of the car. _

_Another hour after his brother took four steps into the motel room and just dropped, shuddering with reaction and cold and a week's worth of exhaustion, staring blankly at Sam's own fingerprints, shading in on his hand. Scrambling to catch him, heart slamming at his throat, skipping against the memory of turning a corner in the Illinois warehouse and seeing Dean strung up, eyes blank and empty of everything that made him real. _

_The hollow grief that he saw now was somehow worse and his voice kept fading out, kept stumbling and catching on the lump in his throat as he eased his brother back against the mattress, cleaned and stitched the jagged gash in his arm and caught him again when he started to slump sideways, eyes still fixed to the marks of Sam's fingers on his hand._

_Four more long hours of Dean curled into him, shivering, lips blued with cold, eyes bruised, just staring until he twitched, jolted awake and Sam thought that hearing the ragged croak he only recognised as his name from a lifetime of translating his brother was the most beautiful thing he'd ever known._

_It took him a day to slide out of Dean's grip as the older man held onto him like he was drowning, sleeping fitfully in between the dreams that shook them both. Sam left the door open as he showered, dignity and pride could go fend for themselves for a while. It was the fastest shower he'd ever taken, just enough to wash the rain and grit and blood from his skin then he was back, one hip hitched up on the bed, leaning back against the headboard, fingers skimming Dean's shoulder. He didn't look at his brother as he asked it, just stared at the window, tried not to wince at the bruises, black on the loosely curled fist in the edge of his vision._

_Dean shrugged, rolled away and to his feet with the limp, lazy grace of the utterly exhausted. He shuffled across the room, silent, shoulders bowed, wrapped in Sam's hoodie and damn if that sight didn't carry some heavy baggage. _

_All Sam had was the desperation in his brother's face through that first day and night, the shaky grip that latched onto him when he moved too far away. It was better than the shell-shocked stare locked onto the bruises in the shape of his hand._

_Dimly, he remembered his brother dragging him out of a wet field and back to the Impala, both of them shivering in the rain even as steam began to wisp from their clothes, turning the car into a sauna that couldn't seem to warm either of them. Even fainter, beyond that, he remembered drifting, lost in the dark that wasn't dark, that he knew were memories he couldn't stand. Fading into shadow with just a warm touch on his hand to anchor him, holding onto it as the void sucked at him, holding on with all his strength, with all his heart and soul as he clawed his way back._

_He stared at the window as Dean hesitated, leaning on the doorway._

"_I don't know, Sam. Few hours, I guess."_

_He shrugged again, painfully. Sam watched him roll around the doorframe and out of sight and bit his lip._

_Sighed, glared at the wall between the bathroom and the beds and huffed out a tired breath as he remembered the setting sun lighting the Djinn as it loomed over him and the high, bright sun gilding his brother's pale, drawn face as they drove away from the empty field._

He didn't know he'd fallen asleep until he blinked himself awake, blind panic tracing along the edges of nightmare and memory, lost in the overriding feeling of emptiness and loneliness, of _too late, I was too damn late and he's gone, I lost him, I woke up and he was gone._

Scrunched into the door, it took him a full minute to recognise the tremors of the engine, the hand locked tight around his shoulder, pressing him back into the seat. He curled his fingers, felt the dull ache of fading bruises and pushed out a shaky breath between his teeth, still reeling, not sure if he was awake or dreaming.

"Dean?"

Squeezed his eyes shut, swallowed hard at the soft query and jerked his head in a rough nod.

"Just a dream, man."

He rolled his head along the seat to shoot his brother an incredulous glare at that, the apologetic shrug and faint stain of colour on Sam's cheeks doing more to settle him than the corn fields blurring past outside.

Chewed on the question for a few miles until he blurted it out in a breathless, jumbled rush.

"What did you see?"

Felt Sam jump beside him and kept his eyes on the window in the quiet. He hadn't exactly been talkative after that one brief confession, after _it hurts like hell but it's worth it. _Not really trusting himself to agree with it, not at all sure what either of them would do if he said _no, it isn't._

"I don't really remember."

His turn to startle, he'd figured Sam wasn't going to answer at all. One elbow cracked against the door handle, a bright flare of pain under the bandages wrapping his wrist. He hissed, rubbed at it, shrugged off the concern that flickered his way.

Sam shrugged back, the gesture too-casual.

"I don't..." he started again, trailed off, opened his mouth a few times until Dean sighed.

"Enough with the guppy impression, Sam. Talk, or don't."

It didn't come out as irritated as he'd meant it to and he growled under his breath as the younger man grinned at him, the smirk soft around the edges with gratitude and understanding. It slid away as he watched and his brother turned back to the road, a thin frown etched between his brows.

"I don't remember. Not really. I just... the Djinn was coming right for me and I couldn't get away. Couldn't even stand up."

It was casual again but it hurt Dean to hear the defencelessness implied. He'd never done helpless well.

"It... did its mojo. Put its hand on my face. You never told me how much that hurt, man."

It was tinged with bitterness, anger and he scowled, stung by the accusation.

"I was a little busy, Sam. Saving your ass, remember?"

He didn't mention the way the lingering burn across his temple had just faded away under the weight of the memories, washed away by sun and home and his heart trying to beat around the blade.

Dean glared at the window, at the corn beyond and saw his brother shake his head, shaking off the anger more than any real irritation.

"Who was it who brought back half the damn diner in Joliet, huh?"

A grin twitched at his mouth at the mumbled apology and he blinked away an echo of looking up from his bed, lethargic from the blood loss and the ache in his heart to see a small mountain of take out bags swaying in the doorway.

Stretching his legs with a sigh, he slid down in the seat again until his neck rested on the seat back.

"I think... maybe it didn't have time to drag me right in. You know? I can remember something... maybe..."

The younger man didn't finish that thought, just shrugged again, kept going in a lightly strangled voice.

"It was just dark and _nothing. _Like a void. Except I could feel you holding my hand."

"Dude!" Dean muttered, more because he knew it was expected, knew his brother wanted the distraction from the hesitation, from the things he'd left unsaid. The older man wondered if that 'something' was Jess or Mom or Dad or maybe even him because he knew his brother too well. "I didn't hold your freakin' hand!"

Sam snorted.

"Sure, princess. Whatever you've gotta tell yourself."

He huffed, stared fixedly at the window for another few miles until his brother spoke again, soft and low.

"It was all there was. Like you were right there beside me and then... I woke up and we were in the middle of the field. It... you pulled me back, Dean."

He turned, met his brother's eyes, hoped Sam could see the silent _I always will _and not the slow burn of that other Sam, bright eyed and happy, content, holding out one smooth, uncalloused hand for the knife.

When Sam - _his _Sam - smirked, he muttered, "Yeah, whatever. Hallmark moment done, dude?" and squirmed down in his seat until the back of his head rested against the window, his cheek against the seat back and shut his eyes, let himself drift away on the rumble of the engine and the whisper of his brother's breath and the quiet murmur of the radio as it clicked on.

And smiled when his head was gently lifted and something warm and soft and smelling of soap and his brother was slipped under it. He curled his hand, still aching as the bruises faded and sighed, remembered long, cold fingers squeezing back

_lightly at first, then tighter as he buried his face in his brother's hair, whispered prayer and encouragement he couldn't remember five seconds later. Tighter still as he started rocking, gently, back and forth, steady as his heart wasn't._

"_Come on, Sam, come on back. I gotcha. I got you. Come on back now."_

_Over and over, back and forth, fingers tightening and tightening until bones shifted in his hand and he could feel the bruises forming._

_He couldn't've cared less._

"_Come on. That's it. Come on back, Sammy."_

_He didn't let go even when his brother choked out his name, jerked, flopped away, gasping like a stranded fish, eyes too wide, face too pale. He just gathered the other man back against him, let them both shiver, the grip on his hand still tight, still bruising, as the moon tipped across the sky, slid in and out of the clouds and lit the empty field with silver._


End file.
